C25K advice?

Collinsky

I'm in week 6 of C25K - I've been doing by time instead of distance, and mostly trying to build up my endurance.

I'm wondering if I shouldn't shift to using distance instead at this point. If I run 30 minutes, that's only 2 miles, since my short little legs and moderate pace have me at a 15-min mile. When I get to week 7, I was considering running 2.5 miles instead of 25 minutes. (It will take me about 37 minutes to do that.)

Or should I change up now to work on my speed, so that I can get to that 10-min mile, before trying to run longer?

LorinaLynn

I did it for distance instead of time, and ran on the treadmill at 5mph. After I was able to run the whole distance, I started working on speed. And I actually found it was easier to run a little faster.

teeley

it depends on how you feel. I ran 30 min a few times then I wanted to see how long it would take to do the full 5k...and once I did the 5k I just kept running that distance and started to work on time...I am still not a fast runner my personal best for a 5k is 35min..

borys12

I would to it for distance. When I did my 1st 5k on treadmill I set pace 10km/h and did it, but was exhausted . I run outside now, and I use GPS app for Android, so the results are quite surprising. Last week I managed 8,5 km, with average 8,2 km/h. Yesterday I made 9,8 km, with average 8,5km/h - this felt very strange as I thought I was slower. I do it for distance, next weekend we ( I run with friends ) will run for 12 km, no matter how fast.

It looks this works much better for endurance, you might be too tired running for speed.

Collinsky

Thanks for the replies! I think I will go with distance from now on, then -- I think that will work well for me. Once I get the distance, I can start working on speed.